


I’ll Take You Higher (And You Can Worship Me Too)

by ShadowsLament



Category: Kingsman: The Secret Service (2015)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-13
Updated: 2015-04-13
Packaged: 2018-03-22 15:48:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,057
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3734494
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShadowsLament/pseuds/ShadowsLament
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>That the particular international arms dealer they’re after enjoys watching underground fighting is a well-known fact, as is his tendency to turn up ringside for just one match--the last--after several nights’ worth of preliminary rounds. Infiltrating the ring to be the last two men standing won’t be a problem, but fighting Harry might reveal more than Eggsy had planned.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I’ll Take You Higher (And You Can Worship Me Too)

If Eggsy could take his eyes off Harry, he still wouldn’t, but it wasn’t nearly simple like that. Not since Harry had cuffed his sleeves over Rorschach blood splatter, the skin beneath bruise-stained, a shade lighter than the color tucked deep into the touch-tempting cleft in his chin. Not after he’d taken to measured pacing inside the chalked-up circle, unrelenting strides that took full advantage of the honestly fucking ridiculous length of his legs. There was nowhere Eggsy’d rather look than at Harry’s generally pressed-firm lips, caught up just then in a sharp, try-your-luck hook.

It had been unreal, the heat that ignited in the coil of Eggsy’s stomach, that spread to scorch every nerve ending, when that first bell had rung and there was Harry, rolling his shoulders, shrugging off all that elegance, all his grace. Every trace of Kingsman shed to expose a struck match, a burning fuse, a man-made disaster armed for decimation.

Harry could’ve easily lapsed into muscle memory and sailed through every one of his matches, but his eyes were focused, shrewd, sparking like muzzle flash after a precisely aimed punch. No one looking at him--intently as Eggsy was or not--would doubt he was in absolute control, and it didn’t matter: Eggsy would be damned before he’d leave Harry to stand alone amid the wreckage. That was never going to happen, not again, he’d sworn it.

His grip fixed, the splintered wood of the fighters’ bench piercing his palms, Eggsy finally tore his gaze away to map the quickest route to Harry through any potential aftershock-tossed debris and the rippling, riotous crowd.

“He might get on with it,” Merlin muttered from behind Eggsy, where he sat with his forearms bridged across his knees, leaning forward, by all appearances riveted and not rapidly losing patience. “If I had to guess, Stane won’t be willing to sit tight another hour while Harry baits this poor bastard.”

“It’ll be over quick enough,” Eggsy said quietly, “and there’s the end of the preliminary rounds. Let ‘im have a little fun before he gets to me.”

“About that,” Merlin said, “remember--”

“We both gotta take hits, I know, Merlin. We’ve got this,” Eggsy returned, flexing his fingers, ignoring the burn of chafed skin pulling tight over his knuckles. Hardly the worst of the damage he’d deliberately taken during his last match, his eyes fell to the vivid bite mark high inside his wrist, a grimace tugging at his split lip. “Did that last one look rabid to you?”

“No,” Merlin said, “but Harry’s? There’s a solid chance that one has fleas.”

Harry’s lank-haired opponent watched him warily from the center of the makeshift ring, dragging the back of a busted-knuckle hand across his mouth. A glistening smear of spit and blood painted his face from mouth to jaw like some unfinished Pollock: a bit of a mess and still a sight worth staring at. Untroubled by the tooth he’d lost to a particularly vicious elbow strike, the man sneered.

_Lunged_.

“Oh, now there’s a mistake,” Merlin murmured, the words barely out of his mouth before Harry stepped into the wild punch, dropping his shoulder. 

A blink-quick uppercut snapped the man’s head back. Sweat streaked off his broad forehead, fat drops to match the blood welling at the corner of his lips. For a fraction of a second, a luxury of time for quite a lot of fighters, let alone one with Harry’s skill, the defensive bracket of his opponent’s balled-up hands wavered. 

Eggsy winced when Harry’s tight left hook connected, the force of it propelling the man’s jaw into a sickening slide. Unfocused eyes stuttered shut as he pitched to the side and went down, his temple striking coarse cement. 

Beneath the crowds’ raucous cheering, Merlin said, “About time.” 

“Look who’s awfully eager to watch Harry and me brawl.” Eggsy grinned, the glance he darted over his shoulder bright, damn-near dancing. “You wanna share your kink with the class, Merlin?” 

“You should take care with what you ask for.” Merlin’s smirk was the sharpest razor Eggsy’d ever seen when he concluded, “Best stick to information you’d know what to do with.” 

Eggsy choked on a burst of startled laughter. “Fuck, Merlin. That was good. I can use that, yeah?” 

Harry approached the bench then, thumbing a wide streak of drying blood off his brow, the edge of the scar shining moon-pale under the clichéd horror movie flicker of the warehouse’s fluorescent lighting. He switched his glance from Merlin to Eggsy and sighed. “Use what, dare I ask?” 

“Your boy was just inquiring after my preferred kinks,” Merlin answered with that one eyebrow arched, all but demanding Harry wade deeper into the fray with a follow-up question. 

“Did he tell you about the jam, then?” Harry asked Eggsy. “Admittedly one of the more pedestrian—“

Merlin snorted. “Well, but if we’re divulging secrets—“

“Gentlemen,” Eggsy interrupted, and didn’t he want to bite his tongue to silence it, make it so no more words trespassed on Merlin’s kink-revealing retribution upon Harry. Because he fucking craved it, a bit of reality to stoke his hungry, deep-night fantasies, the kind of insight that’d break him if he imagined it right. Whatever Harry wanted, needed, asked of him, when the time was right, it was his. As they were stuck in a rank pit of people practically frothing at the mouth for a moment’s worth of brutality, Eggsy jerked his chin towards the empty ring, pointedly staring across it at the small legion of men forcing the expectant crowd to part. “Looks like the company we been waitin’ on’s finally turned up.” 

“So he has.” Harry scanned the area, his eyes casually tracking from Stane’s guards to Roxy, situated behind a short row of chairs reserved for privileged guests, those that came with their pockets full up. “The one I just fought was a Chessman.” He tugged at his earlobe, idly tapping the patch of shadowed skin behind his jaw. “He had a black pawn tattooed here.” 

“Stane’s people have no doubt what they mean to him,” Merlin said. “If he didn’t hit too hard on every aspect of the dark triad, I’d almost find that refreshing.” 

“You,” Eggsy said, pointing at Merlin, “have honest to god problems. And you,” he lightly tapped Harry’s hand where it rested on the bench, shifted to jab his thumb in the direction of the ring, “call that fightin’? Because it looked to me like you not even tryin’.” 

“Stane sent in a pawn. If he’d wanted a fight,” Harry reasoned, “he would have moved one of his rooks.” 

“What the fuck does that even mean, a rook?” Eggsy asked. “You know I ain’t got a chess board stashed in my room, right?” 

“More of a Snakes and Ladders man, are you?” Merlin asked, his lips twitching, straining towards a grin. 

Eggsy glared back and huffed, “Shut up.” He sniffed, once. “The baby loves it. She’s doin’ real good with her numbers now, too.” 

“I’ve always been rather fond of Twister,” Harry chimed in, all deadpan until he looked at Eggsy. Dark and fever-hot, his eyes seemed to linger on Eggsy’s parted mouth for a whole handful of exquisite seconds before he glanced away. “However, my enjoyment of the game inevitably depends on the other player. It’s been some time since I’ve given it a second thought, actually.” 

“The other player,” Eggsy repeated, hushed, like maybe Harry wouldn’t hear, and yeah, that’d probably be for the best. Truth was, he couldn’t be certain he wasn’t staring so close between the lines that his reading was off, blurred by the wanting and the needing tangled round his heart. “Just one, then?” 

“Yes, that’s how I prefer it.” Harry’s fingers found Eggsy’s on the scarred wood of the bench and remained there, pressed tip to tip. “So long as he’s playing to win.” 

“For Christ’s sake,” Merlin bit out, gruff, fond. “You two do realize now is neither the time nor the place? Or has the international stolen arms dealer across the way already slipped your minds?” 

Eggsy turned, using the excuse of his new position to slot his fingers between Harry’s. “Could we possibly forget, Merlin? With you here remindin’ us every other minute?” 

“All right, let’s put it to the test, shall we.” Merlin adjusted his glasses, pushing the bridge up his nose, pressing the left temple tip to the curve of his ear. “How long has Stane been looking this way, sizing you both up?” 

“He channeled Goldilocks for a full minute, choosin’ the best seat,” Eggsy said, and smirked when Merlin’s eyes widened a touch. “That--” 

Harry suddenly surged up from the bench, a snarl playing with his mouth, his eyes harder than his tone. “Was followed by another minute of settling in, moving his pieces around, consequently displacing Lancelot.” 

Lazily, like the man looming over him wasn’t the single largest threat he’d ever encountered, Eggsy stood and shoved his hands in his pockets. He cocked his head at a derisive angle, jutting his chin out. “I’d say we’ve ‘ad his complete attention for ‘bout a minute. He’s favorin’ Harry. Us playactin’ likely won’t sway him none.” 

“Perhaps because you’re not even trying,” Harry said, and slapped an open hand dead-center on Eggsy’s chest, putting a fair bit of weight behind a shove that sent Eggsy stumbling back, back, teetering on his boot heels at the edge of a fall. 

Eggsy dropped into a loose, steadying crouch, and with adrenaline running like accelerant through his veins, let his smile catch, let it burn. 

“Now, ‘Arry,” he said, the ferocious punch of his pulse mirroring Harry’s, blessedly visible above a red-speckled collar, “you can do better than that.” 

Harry’s nostrils flared, and fuck if that searing heat wasn’t rising in his unrelenting stare. No sooner had he taken one intent step closer that an abrasive voice loudly called out, “Oi! You lot, in the ring!” 

“Stick to the plan,” Merlin murmured, a command Eggsy acknowledged with a brisk nod as he passed by, heading for Harry and the narrow aisle that led to the fairly large if pitifully drawn circle. 

Mindful of Stane’s laser-focused attention on them, Eggsy rammed his shoulder into Harry’s back, pushing him off his stride, to the side. He took advantage of the unobstructed path, swaggering by. As he was the first to cross over the smudged chalk, Eggsy cracked his neck, making a show of it, and waited, relishing every split second of Harry’s inexorable approach. 

For his part, Harry didn’t bother with his pacing, striding straight to the center of the ring where Eggsy stood with his feet planted wide, reflexively curling his fingers. Close enough to breathe him in, Harry was, when he stopped with nothing but a scrap of air between them; his scent was cut with sweat, with the metallic bite of blood, and somehow still unmercifully intoxicating. Left with no other choice, not if he wanted to maintain eye contact, Eggsy tipped his head back. 

Soft and low, even though there wasn’t a soul near enough to hear, Harry said, “Come for me, Eggsy. Don’t hold back.” 

“ _Harry_ ,” Eggsy breathed, and despite the situation being all wrong, if some of the aching he felt hearing those words crept into his shattered tone, there was no help for it. Swallowing thickly, he cut off a cascade of images, all of them colored by an endless expanse of stripped bare, flushed skin, of kiss-bitten lips, that swollen, slick shade of sinful, of burnished brown eyes consumed by black. It took an unholy amount of control to not let the part he was playing slip his grasp, but Eggsy managed, creasing his nose, pulling back his lips, all youthful, feral aggression. “Same goes, Harry. I want you to wreck me.” 

Harry responded with a rough growl, the sharp descent of his lashes. 

Before they got a chance to say or do anything more, a long-nosed, heavily freckled man moved into the ring, the same lackey who’d called them there in the first place. On his throat, standing out in stark, onyx relief, was the profile of a horse’s head. “Rules are the same,” he said, “in that there ain’t any. The bell’ll ring just twice this time, to start and when one of you’s been knocked the fuck out. Now, fuck off to your corners, least till I’m clear o’ the circle.” 

“That will be difficult,” Harry said, his nose turned up, a blatant sign of disdain, maybe, or because of the chain-smoke smell wafting through the gap between Freckles’ front teeth, oozing from every fiber of his clothing. “As the two are mutually exclusive--” 

Freckles narrowly eyed Harry. “What the fuck you on about, eh?” 

Tough as it was to suppress a smirk, Eggsy explained straight-faced, “There ain’t no fucking corners in a circle, bruv.” 

A blink and then, “Don’t I fucking know that?” 

“Apparently not, but that’s quite all right,” Harry assured him, “basic geometry can’t be everyone’s strong suit. Now off with you. The crowd is getting impatient with your stalling.” 

“ _My_ stallin’--You fuckin’--If you’re still upright when this one’s done with you, I’ll be takin’ care of that personally.” Freckles punctuated his threat with a gob of spit that had to have been meant for Harry’s shoe but missed the mark by a good margin. “Separate,” he bit out, stomping off, “wait for the fucking bell.” 

“What a charming man,” Harry said, and did as they were bade, moving back till half the ring separated them. 

Eggsy followed his lead, jogging backwards to the line, bouncing in place on the balls of his feet. Behind him, the bit-chomping crowd howled and jeered at a volume that might’ve drowned out the bell’s chime if the thing wasn’t pitched so high. That, and Eggsy was keeping a side-eye watch on the piece of battered brass, also on the torturous bastard taking his time winding the pull chain around his fingers. 

Seconds passed, twelve of them, each one longer than the last, before the hammer fell. 

Eggsy’s heartbeat skidded straight to frantic, like it wasn’t a simple sound he was reacting to but a high voltage charge that confused every muscle in his body with a wire. Fit to vibrate out of his skin, he didn’t get hung up on his tunnel vision where Harry was concerned, because he’d figured it out long ago: Harry grounded him like nothing else in his life ever managed to, like nothing else ever would. One long look at the man was more than enough to change the frequency of his nervous energy to something finer, razor-edged. Something he could use. 

Settled again and dead calm, he spared a moment to appreciate Harry’s target-seeking advance. It was indulgent and Eggsy could already hear Merlin throwing around words like _unwise_ and _foolish, Eggsy, what were you thinking_ , and right then he didn’t give a fuck. There was the plan, and there was his speed. 

Darting in, under Harry’s guard, Eggsy landed a flurry of sharp punches to his abdomen. 

A harsh exhale lit on his cheek, and maybe he should have seen it coming, Harry’s arm sliding beneath his armpit, the hold forcing him up, onto his toes. The punch Harry tilted his body into was no holds barred, cracking off his ribs. 

“ _F-fuck_ ,” Eggsy hissed, and heard-- _felt _\--Harry hum a soothing note.__

Breathing deeply before he could think better of that idea, Eggsy danced back, a little to the left, holding firm to Harry’s arm. The angle was awkward, the pressure on the joint undoubtedly painful, and all Harry did was grimace. All things considered, it was fucking absurd how badly Eggsy wanted to soften the shape of Harry’s lips with his tongue, maybe coax his mouth open a bit, urge him to give up a moan. A sigh. Anything Eggsy could keep. 

“You’re distracted.” 

Tucked in for a close strike, Eggsy stopped short of shaking his head and whispered back, “I’m ‘ere, with you.” 

“And I’ve bloodied your mouth,” Harry said, deflecting another, faster blow. 

“So? I’ve opened that nasty gash ‘neath your scar.” Breaking Harry’s hold, Eggsy bared his teeth in a grin. “Merlin’s probably sittin’ over there beamin’, all proud of us and shit.” 

Harry grunted lightly, and it sounded so much like an aborted laugh that Eggsy’s heart seized up and came back pounding harder. Uncanny, the way they reached for each other at the same time then, but the grappling hold had its advantages, one of them being Harry’s burning warmth against Eggsy’s palm, where he’d sealed his hand over the sweat curled strands of hair on Harry’s nape. 

“Enough of this,” Harry said. “We’ll go to the ground now.” 

“You or me?” Eggsy asked. 

“You, I think.” 

“On my back?” 

“If you can take it. You’ve sustained greater injury to--” 

“Harry.” He could have picked any one of the teasing retorts that came immediately to mind to put Harry at ease, but Eggsy went with simple, earnest. “I can. You know I can. An’ you’ll handle me just right, so I’ve got no worries. Do it.” 

Harry squeezed Eggsy’s neck, quickly, imprinting affection on damp skin before shifting his grip. Without so much as a hitch in his breathing, least not that Eggsy could hear, Harry twisted at the waist, lifting Eggsy off his feet. Harry took him to the ground with one arm braced across his back, with his hand cradling Eggsy’s head. 

The impact knocked a lungful of air free of Eggsy’s mouth, but Harry, Eggsy knew damn well he’d taken the brunt of it on his arms. Probably his knee too. 

Pinned to the cold cement, their hearts knocking against their ribs, beating to escape one for the other it seemed, Eggsy held Harry tight. “All right?” 

“One way...of putting it,” Harry answered, and Eggsy didn’t care for the telling pause, or the slight huff of pain behind the words. “Stane is a couple of feet to our left. Ready?” 

Rather than answer, Eggsy bucked up his hips, counting on Harry to follow his lead and roll with him. He kept their momentum going, forcing Stane’s guards to scramble to get the man out of their way. Not that they could, not entirely, with the crowd clamoring, surging forward for a better view. 

What his Chessmen did do was needlessly topple a few chairs to pull Stane back. Closer to Roxy and the syringe Merlin had thrust at her as they’d left HQ earlier that evening. 

“What do you say, Eggsy,” Harry murmured, whisper-warm, into the crook of Eggsy’s neck, “help me start a riot?” 

“Fuck, Harry.” Catching his fingers in Harry’s hair, so soft above the sweat, Eggsy pulled Harry’s head back, and so what if he went about it too gently to be convincing. He was sure the smile didn’t help any either, but he did that, too. “I thought you’d never ask.” 

Untangling meant the loss of Harry between his legs. Eggsy’d just as soon give up the mission than let him go, but there was nothing for it when Harry’s brow lifted expectantly. Even so, he relaxed the tension in his thighs gradually, and he was off the ground soon as Harry was up, unashamedly staying as close as he reasonably could. 

Harry’d already picked out a target, his line of sight suggesting Eggsy shift to the right. Positive he’d never again in his life see Harry so blatantly telegraph a move, Eggsy dropped almost to his haunches. The haymaker Harry threw caught the jaw of an unnaturally large man with a rash of acne scars spread across his face. 

Owlishly blinking, the man shook his head. Frowned. And fucking roared, charging at Harry, who turned at the last second with the tidy precision of a matador. 

The place went up like a tinderbox after that, a brawl erupting in the pocket of the crowd just behind Harry. It spread quickly, the agents they had stashed here and there helping things along. From the corner of his eye Eggsy saw Percival incapacitate two of the Chessmen that hadn’t already gotten sucked into the thick of the fighting. 

Hastily elbowing his way through the sprawling crush, his stomach twisted with Harry out of his sight, Eggsy stumbled to a stop at Stane’s feet. He looked between Roxy and Merlin, kneeling on either side of the arms dealer’s prone body. “How we gettin’ him outta here again?” 

“Quickly. Any remaining details are my concern now,” Merlin said brusquely. “Find Harry and go, see to your injuries, the both of you. And, Eggsy, don’t let him tell you he’s fine. This,” he cast a glance around the warehouse, the chaos they’d provoked reflected in his glasses, “is too close.” 

His jaw clenched tight, Eggsy nodded. “I’m not leavin’ ‘im tonight, so if you need me, or him--” 

“I’ll see to it that’s not the case,” Merlin promised, and jerked his head to the side. “Go. Last I saw Harry he was dealing with that _charming_ man.” 

“Eggsy,” Roxy’s voice reached out, “let him take care of you as well.” 

Gone still, Eggsy brushed a glance over her face. She hadn’t said a thing when she’d figured it out, his feelings for Harry, just looked between the two of them with her eyebrow arched, silently asking for confirmation. It took maybe a second to decide, and then he was holding her curious stare and slowly dipping his head, unable to keep a small smile from claiming his lips. The grin she shot back was it, the end of the conversation. It might not have been a secret between them after that, but she’d joined him in guarding it like one. 

They’d been silent about it so long he wasn’t sure how to break it, had honestly no clue how to respond to her gentle suggestion. The thing was, he didn’t have to, he could fall back on instinct and keep his mouth shut, and that’d be all right. She’d get it, the same way she got everything else. 

Not for the first time, Eggsy thought back on all the stars he’d wished on as a kid, on the birthday candles he’d blown out at his mum’s insistence, fiercely shaking his head when pressed for a hint of what it was he’d wanted, and found it all a bit hard to wrap his mind around, because quite a few of those wishes came true. He'd gotten more than he'd ever asked for in Kingsman and Roxy and Merlin. In Harry. 

Determined to find the man quickly, before Harry had even a second to spare on wondering if he’d been abandoned, Eggsy shoved through the frenzied brawlers, dodging as many knuckle-leading fists as possible, catching more than one punch on his biceps and back. Frustration snapped at his temper, fraying the leash, until Harry was there, finally, stepping over an out cold with his mouth open Freckles. 

“Eggsy,” Harry said, relief falling like a feather on the last syllable. “Shouldn’t you be with Merlin, secur--” 

“Nuh,” Eggsy interrupted, “there’s only one place I’m meant to be.” Standing beside Harry, close enough to lightly bump his elbow, Eggsy glanced up. “We should go. I could maybe hot-wire one of them cars out front, that _gor_ geous old-school Ast--” 

“We’ll save grand theft auto for another day, if it’s all the same to you. I’d like to be able to enjoy it.” Harry looked across the warehouse, towards a propped open set of double doors washed in the pale glow of headlights. He started walking, and Eggsy watched, entirely entertained, as people scrambled to get out of his way. “Merlin arranged for taxis. With any luck, that’s ours waiting.” 

“A driver? Thank fuck,” Eggsy sighed. “I’d do it, get us back in one piece, but--” 

“It’s been a long day.” 

“A long week, more like.” Striding over the threshold, Eggsy tipped his head back, an open invitation for the cool night air to take further advantage of him. “God, that feels good.” 

“If only it smelled half as pleasant,” Harry said before opening the door, gesturing for Eggsy to slide into the taxi ahead of him. Folding neatly if tiredly into the seat, Harry addressed the driver. “To mine, Malory.” He turned to Eggsy as the car sped away from the warehouse, hesitance a weight on his mouth, drawing one corner down. “Unless you’d prefer--” 

Eggsy shut that down, shaking his head. “You got it right. First try, as usual.” 

“Merlin would be happy to disabuse you of that notion.” Harry let his head fall back to the rest. “All you need do is give him several hours of your time and ask.” 

“No offense to Merlin, but if I got several uninterrupted hours to spend wit’ someone, he ain’t top of the list.” 

“Yes, well, Roxy, I’m afraid, wouldn’t have the same dirt.” 

After the empty car lot, the cramped alley, the eerie as fuck children’s park, with the roundabout that kept spinning and spinning with no one on it, and finally the last set of fights at the warehouse, there wasn’t a stretch of skin that didn’t feel scraped raw, Eggsy’s muscles a symphony of discordant throbbing. Factor in exhaustion, and he had his reason for blurting out, “You bein’ purposely thick right now?” 

Harry opened his eyes, frowned. “What?” 

“Nuthin’,” Eggsy said after a minute spent looking for the lie in Harry’s sincere confusion. Slouched low in the seat, he tucked his chin in close to his chest, tried and failed to resist the pull of Harry’s eyes, unerringly following the line of Eggsy’s profile in the intimate dark of the backseat. Eggsy sighed and shifted to stare back. His voice, little more than a rasp, thick with confession, slid into the quiet. “It was you I was talkin’ ‘bout. You I’d--” 

The car pulled to a stop, Harry’s home rising in front of the windshield. 

“Eggsy?” 

Hurrying out of the taxi, Eggsy put on a lopsided grin. “Hope you got plenty of ice in there.” 

Harry followed at a sedate pace, unlocking the door, allowing Eggsy to brush by him. He moved with Eggsy towards the kitchen, his silence charged, unsettling. 

Grabbing a couple of dish towels--pristine white, the unfolded lines crisp and ruler straight--Eggsy spread them out on the counter and started piling a small mountain of ice onto the center of each. 

“Bring those upstairs. I’ll find some aspirin,” Harry said, and vanished around the corner. 

“Aspirin?” Eggsy called after him, his attention yanked away from Harry’s footfalls on the stairs by a shock of cold against his palm. Opening his fist, he tossed the melting cube of ice into the sink. “Tell me you got somethin’ stronger than that, Harry.” 

Distantly, he heard Harry reply, “We’ll make do.” 

The towels knotted, Eggsy meant to take the stairs slowly and wound up turning it into a race, skipping every other step, paying for it in incandescent shades of pain radiating up from his shins. 

“Next time a mission like that comes up I’m nominatin’ Percival for it,” Eggsy muttered. “And Tristan. That one’s been lookin’ for an excuse to use those modified brass knuckles of--Fuck, sorry.” Eggsy dropped his gaze, too late. His memory had latched on, could recall with absolute clarity the shift of beautifully formed muscle under smooth skin marked by old scars and fresh color as Harry carefully shrugged out of his ruined shirt. “I didn’--the door was open and I thought--” 

“You should remove yours as well,” Harry said, sitting on the edge of the bed, “so we can assess the damage and take care of it.” 

“What?” Eggsy lifted his head, blinking, catching on when Harry tossed his own shirt aside. “That’s--it makes sense, right? I’ll just,” he looked at the ice packs, one in each hand and, if he kept standing there, soon to be dripping water on the hardwood floor, “put these...somewhere, first.” 

Harry slipped off his shoes. “The nightstand’s fine.” 

Hanging onto a deep breath, Eggsy shuffled the bottle of aspirin and glass of water to the back of the nightstand, making room for the ice packs. All of five minutes might’ve passed since he’d tied the knots, but he used the time it took to tighten them to drag in another, deeper breath. It hitched in his throat, this one, and he only hoped Harry didn’t hear. 

“Eggsy.” 

“Gettin’ to it,” Eggsy said, and grabbed the material at the base of his neck, tugging it over his head and biting off a pained groan. Unsure what to do with it, he bunched up the shirt and shoved it in his pocket. “Roxy taught me a neat trick for gettin’ blood out, but I’m think--” 

“Eggsy.” 

Tension pulled Eggsy’s shoulders back, brought his head up so he was staring at the wall. “Yeah?” 

“You have several uninterrupted hours ahead of you,” Harry said, soft but firm. “If I understood the last thing you said in the taxi correctly, the person you’d spend them with is in this room, and he would very much like you to come here.” 

Eggsy turned, met Harry’s eyes. “He would?” 

“If you keep yourself from me much longer, I’ll come to you. On my knees if--” 

“Christ, Harry,” Eggsy breathed, fairly certain as he moved to the end of the bed that it couldn’t be the ground shaking, that it had to be him coming undone, “you can’t just say things like that.”

Harry hesitated. “Was I wrong, then?”

“Wrong? About--” Eggsy’s eyes widened. “Fuck no, I--”

Interrupting with his fingertips, gently pressed to a blossom of bruises over Eggsy’s rapidly beating heart, Harry said, “Neither of us would be able to finish what we start tonight, but if you can bear the sting,” he brushed his thumb over Eggsy’s lip, his touch lighter still where Eggsy’s skin had swelled around the split, “I’d like to lie here and kiss you until we’re too tired to--” 

“I ain’t nearly that exhausted yet,” Eggsy whispered, licking his lip, the tip of Harry’s thumb. 

“No?” Leaning in, Harry’s lips curved up in a small, contented smile Eggsy instinctively knew was his, something he could keep. “Neither am I.”

**Author's Note:**

> I hugely appreciate every kudos and comment! 
> 
> (I'm shadowslament over on tumblr, too.)


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